Afghans Demonstrate Against US Quran-Burning That Never Happened

Saturday witnessed a second wave of demonstrations against the threats by small American fundamentalist churches (especially the Dove Outreach group of some 50 in Gainesville, Fl.), to burn copies of the Muslim holy book, the Quran, on September 11. News that the planned bonfire of the scripture had been called off did not reach the provinces in time to avert the rallies, which were sparked in part by Taliban pamphleteering against the US.

But it seems clear to me in any case that the threat of Quran-burning by a few dozen kooks in the US is only a pretext for these demonstrations, which inevitably are actually about the grievances of Afghans under foreign military occupation. That is why the story of the plans for burning the Quran has brought people into the streets in Aghanistan to protest in impressive numbers (in contrast to most other parts of the Muslim world, where there were no similarly-sized rallies).

The largest demonstration on Saturday was held in Pul-i Alam, the capital of Logar province south of the national capital of Kabul. (For basic information about Logar, see this pdf file). Pajhwok News Agency reports that some 10,000 demonstrators assembled in the streets of Pul-i Alam. Protesters burned tires in the streets and sometimes torched shops. At one point the crowd, enraged, began moving toward the governor’s mansion, and local police dispersed them, apparently by firing above their heads. The demonstrators briefly cut the road south linking the city to Pakistan. (Given that Pul-i Alam’s population is only about 88,000, I find the 10,000 figure hard to credit unless the demonstration was planned out by the Taliban and protesters were bused in from the rural areas.) Logar, with a population of around 320,000, is about 2/3s Pushtun, with the rest being speakers of Dari Persian, whether Sunni Tajiks or Shiite Hazaras.

Pajhwok maintains that in the Afghania Pass region of the Nejrab district in Kapisa Province just northeast of Kabul, some 6,000 protesters, including women, gathered from that and surrounding districts. They chanted anti-American and anti-Israel phrases. The agency interviewed a member of the provincial council from Afghania Pass, Haji Lutfullah Zakiri. He said that were the Quran to be desecrated by Americans, a large number of young men were ready to turn suicide bombers. He suggested that French NATO troops in the province of Kapisa would likely be assaulted first of all. (Again, 6,000 sounds to me like a large number to meet in a remote place).

A third rally was held in the central Parwan Province, in Koh-i Safi district, according to Pajhwok. About 1,500 people shouted “Death to America and Death to Israel.” The demonstrators released an ultimatum aimed at the United States, pledging a jihad or war against the United States if the Quran were defiled. Their resolution also threatened to set Americans ablaze in revenge for the burning of the Muslim scripture. Also just north of Kabul, Parwan is largely Tajik (Sunni Persian-speakers) and its residents fought the Taliban tooth and nail in the 1990s. My guess is that the small demonstration and threats were generated mainly by the Pashtuns, an ethnic minority in Parwan.

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7 Responses

The lack of anti-burning rallies outside Afghanistan is indeed noteworthy.

Whether this would change if the Kur’an were actually burned as (earlier) proposed remains to be determined.

Would it matter, BTW, if the books in question were actually burned but were written wholly in English? Would this lead to their being viewed as less holy? And does the (slight) USA government opposition to the proposed burning reduce the Muslim grievance against the USA?

Ahmad, the opinion-polling is clear that most Tajiks and Hazaras have a positive view of the NATO presence and despise the Taliban. The people you are talking about are a tiny minority among those groups

Protests against NATO have been a fairly common occurrence for some time. Long before the media hyped this attention seeking clown. It may be that NATO, even amongst the non Pashtuns, isn’t as popular as it thinks it is. Hating the Taliban isn’t the same as liking NATO.

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